One of the grand delusions of Safety is its focus on physical harm. This is fostered by the silly language of ‘hazards’ and ‘controls’. Even then, the silly industry describes psychosocial harm as a ‘hazard’ (https://safetyrisk.net/what-is-psychosocial-safety/ ). You couldn’t make such stupidity up!

The truth is, the most profound and everlasting harm is rarely seen (https://safetyrisk.net/the-scars-and-harm-you-dont-see-and-cant-count/).

This is well documented by Besser Van Der Kolk in The Body Keeps the Score (https://ia601604.us.archive.org/35/items/the-body-keeps-the-score-pdf/The-Body-Keeps-the-Score-PDF.pdf).

I’m reminded by the lyrics by Missy Higgins (https://genius.com/Missy-higgins-scar-lyrics) in her song Scar (https://youtu.be/XPK2FmoA1Bc?si=ODRI5GpIX6IkaPDt ) that the greatest harm of injured emotions/persons is accepted by all of us as part of growing up (https://safetyrisk.net/scars-and-wounds-on-the-inside/ ).

When we use the language of hazards applied to psychosocial harm, we create the idea that they can be ‘fixed’. The language of ‘controls’ targeted at mental health is delusional nonsense.

Psychosocial harm should never be associated with the language of ‘hazards’ (https://safetyrisk.net/what-is-psychosocial-safety/ ). Only Safety could be so ignorant of such linguistics.

The reality is that trauma leaves psychological scars that are not helped by the ludicrous language of ‘hazards’.

Part of being a fallible person is learning to live with harm. This is the gift of Everyday Social Resilience (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/everyday-social-resilience-being-in-risk/).

When one doesn’t expect harm as is promoted by zero vision, the outcome is greater harm created by the naïve expectation of perfection.

This is why safety engineers have no idea of the damaging linguistics of this silly language of zero (https://safetyrisk.net/the-linguistics-of-zero/) nor, its unethical intent. The more safety spruiks its ignorance (https://safetyofwork.com/episodes/ep12-is-adopting-a-zero-harm-policy-good-for-safety) on linguistics and ethics, the more embarrassing it becomes.

This is why safety has no idea of what to do with zero.

This is also why Safety rarely speaks about the need for resilience and personhood. There’s no need for resilience when your language and beliefs for safety are framed by perfection!

When it comes to mental health and psychosocial health there is rarely any ‘fixing’.

This is why the language of ‘bouncing back’ is also nonsense. When one experiences harm psychosocially, we never bounce back but rather transition to a new state that includes resilience in living with that change.

In SPoR, we represent this semiotically with the following graphic. Figure 1. Maturing and Resilience.

Figure 1. Maturing and Resilience.

Every event that occurs in us and to us becomes a part of our developing history and building of character. We never return back to our old self or our old social relationships. Yet, these events are built into who we become. The story of Everyday Social Resilience is the story of becoming. Every event, every harm and every moment of learning become part of the movement of maturation. We may start at birth from zero but quickly accumulate experiences so that at K we embody all of the experiences that preceded it.

Reading Benner is a good start (https://archive.org/details/humanbeingbecomi0000benn ).

Many of our wounds never heal. And, our scars remind us of who we were and our becoming.

Suffering is often a test of your methodology and method of being and living.

There is no science of suffering nor rationality about suffering (https://safetyrisk.net/suffering-sometimes-there-is-no-reason/ ), just as there’s no knowing about death other than its finality. This is all contradicted by the stupidity of zero (https://safetyrisk.net/zero-and-a-culture-of-denial/).

Because Safety has made harm and suffering evil (https://safetyrisk.net/is-harm-and-suffering-evil/) it has extricated itself from any sense-able discussion about harm, maturity, wisdom and learning. Similarly, Safety’s fear of the word ‘faith’ (eg Dekker) demonstrates its inability to engage in any discussion of metaphysics, even though much of the language of zero is metaphysical!

This is why S2 doesn’t talk about the resilience of persons but rather the resilience of systems (eg. Hollnagel etc) This is just more of Safety’s love of objects (https://www.worksafetyhub.com.au/blog/safety-ii-an-innovative-approach-to-managing-risk-in-the-modern-world ). This is why Safety never talks about Personhood and ethics.

So, scars remain hidden, the trauma remains under the surface and without a mature methodology of Resilience, Safety continues to focus on objects.

This is why not-so-Differently safety focuses on ‘capacity’ and ‘who’s in control?’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3L_TQG-xBs) and talks about the resilience of objects (Dekker) not persons. Resilience is neither a ‘capacity’ nor is it measurable. In Everyday Social Resilience the question is NOT ‘who is in control?’ This is just more traditional safety – hazards and controls. The same applies to the nonsense language of ‘drift’.

Learning resilience is about being NOT in control and living in uncertainty.

The language of ‘capacity’ is a quantitative metaphor and useless for any mature discussion of resilience and mental health. Such language is just more traditional safety.

In Everyday Social Resilience the language needs to be about being, becoming and wisdom in NOT knowing. The language needs to be about faith and risk. Moreso, the language needs to be about NOT what is in me but who I am in my social being. I discuss all this in my latest book Everyday Social Resilience (for free download) (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/everyday-social-resilience-being-in-risk/) which includes practical, positive tools/methods to enable Everyday Social Resilience.